


Hunting

by ljs



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: AU, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-31
Updated: 2010-10-31
Packaged: 2017-10-13 00:02:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/130602
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ljs/pseuds/ljs
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Let's say it's an AU post-"Grave" (to be determined as you wish). Nighttime, London, and a stranger watches an encounter in a nice hotel bar...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hunting

Stefan Partridge slides onto a seat at the furthest edge of this quiet, chic hotel bar, casually unbuttons his suit jacket, and just as casually raises a finger to the hovering bartender. “Bloody Mary, please.”

It's a cliché, perhaps – as is the flask of blood he keeps in an inner pocket of his suit, as is his practice of hunting for victims in posh hotel bars. But Stefan is in some ways a real traditionalist. After a tour of the Continent, he's been in London two months, spending every third night at a hotel bar in the West End, dining off a patron or two whom he selects according to their style. It's a good unlife, he thinks.

When the glass filled with (substitute) red slides in front of him, he smiles his thanks at the bartender, then takes a sip. Perfect. Now if only there's someone here who might be worth drinking from...

Older couple in the corner, too county. Tourist trio at the table nearest the bar, too gauche. But at the bar, just a couple of seats down from him, there's a woman drinking alone.

Perhaps too sharp-featured for beauty, he thinks, but she is attractive. Oddly ageless, too – young face, old eyes. Lovely slim, nervy body, dressed well in cashmere and a sleek skirt. He's rather taken by the way one of her shoes seems poised to slip off her toes. Even as he thinks this, however, she leans down and settles the slingback more firmly on her foot. As she rises, she drifts a fingertip over the seam in her stocking.

He takes another sip of his Bloody Mary, and fancies he can already taste her in all _sorts_ of ways.

When he looks back over his shoulder, however, he sees a distinguished grey-haired man standing in the doorway. The man, in light grey suit and open-necked shirt, seems to be scanning the bar's patrons just as Stefan has been doing. Vampire? Vampire in what Stefan has already decided is _his_ bar?

After another look, Stefan decides it's not. The man has too much sun-kissed colour in his face, as if he's been outside in the country. Horseback riding, probably: the man has a little upper-middle-class edge, but not as county as the rejected couple in the corner.

Stefan sips again, and smiles against the glass. The man has seen the solitary woman at the bar, and even from this distance, the man's eyes behind those well-chosen rimless glasses shine with interest. And then the man, with would-be casualness, slips off his wedding ring and puts it in his pocket, and Stefan has to choke back a laugh.

Maybe he'll be really lucky and take both of them – depending on how the man plays his hand with the woman.

The man strides over to the bar, then hesitates for a moment just a step or two behind the woman. “Er, I beg your pardon – is this seat taken?” he says, in just the voice – posh, educated, with a hint of steel under the hesitation – Stefan would have guessed.

The woman tilts her head and surveys the man. Her brown eyes immediately gleam with the same interest the man had shown – even if, truth be told, the man is perhaps a little old for her. In a bright American voice which reminds Stefan uncomfortably of long-lost sunny days, she says, “Sure. By you, if you want to sit here.”

The man leans in, not too aggressively, not too shyly – well-played, in Stefan's opinion – and puts his ringless hand on the woman's back. “Thank you,” he murmurs, and then takes the seat.

The man orders the best single-malt the bar carries; the woman, although pressed, decides to let her gin-and-tonic ride. They exchange names. Rupert, that's the man. Anya, that's the woman.

Rupert and Anya. Stefan turns those names over in his mind. Yes, what perfect names for his supper.

Anya's gaze slides over Stefan at that moment, and he tenses – he'd rather not make himself known until they leave. That's his traditional hunting practice, anyway...

But Rupert catches her attention again, and she rests her elbow on the bar, tunnels her hand under her fall of artfully streaked hair, and smiles flirtatiously at her quarry. “What do you do?” she asks, and Stefan doesn't actually think she means Rupert's occupation.

Rupert leans closer to her. Even in side-view, the answer is 'Anything you want,' even though the spoken reply is something about the British Museum.

Anya's a dealer in antiquities, apparently, and the two of them carry on a desultory conversation about art, historical artifacts and what belongs to whom, the latest exhibition at the V&A. Their real conversation is written in the body, however: the man's hand finding a resting place on the small of Anya's back, in danger of slipping lower; Anya's shoe falling off for real, and her stockinged foot brushing against Rupert's leg; the voices getting softer, deeper, more intimate.

When Rupert steals the first kiss, Stefan isn't surprised. Nor is he shocked by Anya's pliant response and the wandering nature of her free hand over Rupert's inner thigh. The second kiss is much, much more serious.

Cold as he is, Stefan can feel the steam from here. He briefly considers luring both of them back to his own hotel room, considers what it might be like to be inbetween such hot bodies...

No, he decides regretfully. Just supper.

“Anya, would you like to go get a bite to eat?” Rupert murmurs.

Anya's eyes widen. “Already? But, I mean... _Yes._ Yes, of course.”

On a wave of muted laughter, Rupert pays for their drinks and then somewhat masterfully sweeps her off the barstool and onto her feet. (She's recovered her shoe, Stefan notes.) They stand close together, Rupert looming over her: they look right, Stefan thinks. Their tastes should blend nicely.

With his own practised smoothness he pays for his own drink and follows them out into the night.

They're already locked together, only a few steps from the bar's entrance, half-shadowed underneath the awning of a closed restaurant. Stefan hangs back just a moment – only seems fair to let them enjoy each other's mouths, just for a moment, and, demons and gods, they do appear to be enjoying themselves. Anya looks as if she'd climb right up Rupert's strong body...

Then she slides down, takes a breath, and says, “Bad guy at your nine o'clock, honey.”

“I saw him, darling,” Rupert says huskily, almost fussily, and they sound bloody _married_ or something, Stefan thinks in some confusion.

And the stake is out of Anya's handbag and into Rupert's hand, and the sharp point of it is coming at Stefan, and he can't get away, he's trapped against this wall, bricks cutting into his palms, stake at the heart, who was hunting here...

Dust.


End file.
